Posted on 05/09/2005 5:53:40 AM PDT by .cnI redruM
In one of my favorite episodes of the Simpsons, Troy McLure — famed Hollywood personality and star of such classics as The Greatest Story Every Hula-ed and They Came to Burgle Carnegie Hall — needs to get hitched in a sham marriage to Homer's sister-in-law in order to save his career. You see, Troy has a dark secret. When asked if it's that he's gay, McClure responds, "Gay? I wish! If I were gay they'd be no problem! No, what I have is a romantic abnormality, one so unbelievable that it must be hidden from the public at all cost."
I bring this up because a) I still laugh at it, and b) the prosecution has rested its case against Michael Jackson. Michael Jackson's perversions are as close as we have today to Troy McLure's situation. Of course, the key difference is that Troy's terrible secret seemed to involve tropical fish. That's funny. Jackson's more terrible and less secret perversion is that it involves little boys.
A lot of eat-your-spinach media critics think it is unseemly for the press to pay attention to the Jackson trial. To them it's just another exploit of tabloid TV. I couldn't disagree more. First of all, this story would have been hot stuff even during the Golden Age of Murrow. After all, coverage of Fatty Arbuckle and Charlie Chaplin moved a lot of newspapers back in the day.
More important, this isn't like the childish coverage of the "runaway bride" — er, sorry — "flee-ancee" we've been subjected to. One can't help but suspect that the producers who pumped the story into a round-the-clock obsession were disappointed when it was discovered the woman hadn't been abducted but just got a case of cold feet. Still, since people who buy bridal magazines are a more valuable demographic than those who read The Economist, they seemed perfectly willing to run, and run, and run with the story.
No, the Jackson story is about a hugely rich and successful man using his money and influence to cover up years of sexual and psychological abuse of children. It's about the moral depravity Hollywood is willing to tolerate and enable. (Then again, tolerance and enabling are really the same thing.)
In many respects this is the perfect story to unite the entire country. O.J. Simpson's murder trial split the nation because Simpson's lawyers expertly manipulated the case into a fight about racial politics, rather than the obvious fact that Simpson murdered two people.
The Terri Schiavo case wasn't purely a courtroom battle, but it certainly divided America along fascinating fault lines. The media desperately tried to portray it as a purely left-right conflict, but that analysis was too simplistic to account for the many splits on the right over the issue, or the presence of Ralph Nader and Jesse Jackson on the pro-life side.
Meanwhile, Michael Jackson can have no defenders on left or right. He doesn't fit any normal categories. Like Troy McLure, he's not gay. Unlike O. J. Simpson, he's not even black anymore. Who was it who said, Where else but America can a poor black boy grow up to be a rich white woman?
Indeed, even if you think the prosecution failed to make its case — which it may well have — it is almost impossible to be on Michael Jackson's side or on the side of those who've allowed him to live the disgusting lifestyle he has.
At minimum, Michael Jackson's handlers knew he had a reputation for abusing children. Before that, they knew he behaved in ways with children that sane, normal, people do not. They saw how he surrounded himself with a giant playroom used to entice boys into his bed. Jackson's staff crafted elaborate electronic warning systems other safeguards to ensure that Jackson was not caught doing anything with children by people who might turn against him. What sort of person installs an electronic warning system for an accused pederast? What sort of person sees that system every day — or even every now and then — and does nothing? What sorts of parents send their kids to a rumored sex offender's house on the thin rationalization that he was never technically convicted of wrongdoing?
The Michael Jackson story is an extremely exaggerated microcosm of Hollywood's moral climate. Hollywood is ruled by a class of people who believe that money solves problems and that the worst sin in the world is to judge another person's behavior. "Comedian" Bill Maher, for example, recently explained that he thought the charges were no big deal, even if true. After all, Jackson didn't rape anyone, he's merely accused of "servicing" young boys — and that's not nearly as bad as getting beaten up by schoolyard bullies. Wrong. In normal America, if kids beat up your kid, you demand a reckoning. If a middle-aged freak "services" your kid, you call a hearse.
Obviously, there are lots of people in the entertainment industry who are horrified by the allegations and behavior of Michael Jackson. But only in Hollywood could such a thing happen in the first place.
I can't help but wonder sometimes whether the sick puppies our entertainment industy spawns really do get used to recruit the jihadists and other people who do evil things to Americans both here and abroad.
If the prosecution failed to make its case then everything else is moot. Any legal behavior on Jackson's part or on the part of his enablers is none of our business.
I read his self help book "Smoke Yourself Thin".
I personally think even tho the prosecution was weak there was enough there to know there was a pattern of behavior by jackson over and over and enough of witnesses seeing things i.e. underwear by tub etc that something NOT right going on. Why they didn't stop it is another thing however I do believe he will be convicted of the molestation charges. Anyone else?
I saw the critically acclaimed documentary: "Fireworks, the Silent Killer"
McClure has another self help book titled "Get Some Confidence, Stupid!".
http://www.snpp.com/guides/troy.mcclure.html
Movies
[7F13] "Cry Yuma"
[7F13] "Here Comes the Coast Guard"
[8F01] "Preacher With a Shovel" (with Dolores Montenegro)
[8F03] "The Revenge of Abe Lincoln"
[8F03] "The Wackiest Covered Wagon in the West"
[8F14] "Calling All Quakers" (with Dolores Montenegro)
[8F14] "Gladys The Groovy Mule"
[8F14] "Today We Kill, Tomorrow We Die" (1)
[9F07] "Dial M for Murderousness"
[9F07] "The Erotic Adventures of Hercules"
[9F20] "'P' is for Psycho"
[9F20] "The President's Neck is Missing!"
[1F21] "The Boatjacking of Supership 79"
[1F21] "Hydro, the Man With the Hydraulic Arms"
[2F07] "Good-Time Slim, Uncle Doobie, and the Great 'Frisco Freak-Out"
[3F15] "Muppets Go Medieval" (1977) (with Dyan Cannon and The Muppets)
[3F15] "The Greatest Story Ever Hulaed"
[3F15] "They Came to Burgle Carnegie Hall"
[3F15] "Meet Joe Blow"
[3F15] "Give My Remains to Broadway"
[3F15] "The Verdict Was Mail Fraud"
[3F15] "Leper in the Backfield"
[3F15] "Make-Out King of Montana"
[3F15] "The Electric Gigolo"
[3F15] "The Contrabulous Fabtraption of Professor Horatio Hufnagel" (also director) (2)
[5F11] "David vs. Super-Goliath"
[5F11] "Suddenly Last Supper" (3)
[SI#2] "Space Mutants VII: Cry of the Space Mutant"
[SI#8] "The Itchy & Scratchy Movie" (bit part)
[SC#1] "Jagged Attraction"
[SC#1] "Look Who's Still Oinking"
[SC#5] "Three Men And A Nuke"
[SC#12] "Ten Was Too Many"
[SC#14] "The Computer Wore Puka Shells"
[SC#14] "The Frontier Family Get Deer Ticks"
[SC#14] "The Mediocre Journey"
[SC#??] "Slow Down David Copperfield, What's That Down Your Sock?"
[BM#1] "Calling All Lumberjacks"
[BM#1] "The Day Paul Bunyan Cried"
[RM#412] "Radioactive Man III"
[SJ] "The Pulverizer"
[SJ] "Radioactive Man II: Bring On The Sequel"
[SJ] "Sleepless in Shelbyville"
[SJ] "The Unbearable Moistness of Sweating"
[TC] "Coffee, Tea, or Fiddle Dee Dee"
[TC] "Eenie Meeni Miney, Die"
[AD] "A Bridge Too Far" (as Todd, the worlds unluckiest dentist)
[AD] "Swing, Swang, Swung" (as Bobby, the happy-go-lucky boyhood friend of Ook-Ook the lip cancer chimp)
[AD] "Three Men and a Bunsen Burner" (as the doomed Professor Landrew)
[AD] "Wake Up, Finnegan" (as Paddy the relentless bell-ringer)
Notes
"Today We Kill, Tomorrow We Die" is the first McBain movie, according to the McBain trading card.
Troy turned down the part of McBain's sidekick in "McBain IV : Fatal Discharge" to do "Contrabulous Fabtraption". [3F15]
In 5F11, Troy McClure also plays Noah in a religious movie with an unknown title.
TV Series
[8F07] "Troy and Company's Summertime Smile Factory"
[8F07] "Buck Henderson, Union Buster"
[8F12] "Handel With Kare"
[SC#6] "Troy McClure's Pre-Teen Soul Machine"
TV Specials
[8F18] Miss American Girl Pageant (host)
[9F07] "Carnival of the Stars" (host)
[3F31] "The Simpsons 138th Episode Spectacular" (host)
[3F31] "Alien Nose Jobs" (Fox Network Special)
[3F31] "Five Fabulous Weeks of the Chevy Chase Show" (Fox Network Special)
[4F20] "The Simpsons Spinoff Showcase" (host)
[SC#29] "Troy McClure's Aloha from Louie's House of Shave Ice" (Live Via Satellite!)
Musicals
[3F15] "Stop the Planet of the Apes : I Want To Get Off!"
[TC] "Muttonchops" (A one-man musical tribute to the great thinkers of the 19th Century.)
[AD] "Trucks" (as Rod, the happy-go-lucky fire engine)
Cartoons
[4F12] "Christmas Ape"
[4F12] "Christmas Ape Goes To Summer Camp"
[SC#6] "Barnum -- The Animated Series"
Educational films and the like
[8F16] "The World Without Zinc" (child actor?)
[8F22] "Fuzzy Bunny's Guide To You-Know-What"
[8F22] "Here Comes The Metric System"
[8F22] "Lead Paint: Delicious But Deadly"
[9F14] "60 Minutes of Car Crash Victims"
[9F14] "Alice's Adventures through the Windshield Glass"
[9F14] "The Decapitation of Larry Leadfoot"
[2F15] Pepsi Presents Fractions
[3F03] Meat Council film : "Meat And You: Partners in Freedom" (1)
[3F03] "Two Minus Three Equals Negative Fun"
[3F03] "Firecrackers: The Silent Killer"
[3F07] "Shoplifters BEWARE"
[3F07] "Designated Drivers: The Lifesaving Nerds"
[3F07] "Phony Tornado Alerts Reduce Readiness"
[3F13] "Young Jebediah Springfield" (A Watch-and-Learn Production)
[3F15] "Locker Room Towel Fights : The Blinding of Larry Driscoll"
[BM#1] "A Tree Grew In Springfield"
[SJ] "Turning Comics Into Movies"
Notes
Note : The Meat Council film is number 3F03 in the "Resistance is Useless" Series.
Do-It-Yourself Videos
[9F05] "Dig Your Own Grave and Save"
[9F05] "Mothballing Your Battleship"
[9F05] "The Half-Assed Guide to Foundation Repair"
Telethons
[1F03] "Let's Save Tony Orlando's House"
[1F03] "Out With Gout '88"
[1F03] "Springfield Public Television Telethon"???
"I Can't Believe They Invented It!"
[7F13] The Candy Bar That Cleans Teeth
[7F14] Eyeball Whitener
[8F07] Spiffy, the 21st Century Stain Remover
[9F20] The Juice Loosener
[AD] Styro-Glow! (the incredibly simple seventeen-step solution that makes your styrofoam look brand new)
[AD] New Improved Brick! (the waterproof sponge! Now in decorator colors!!)
[AD] Brew 'n' Chew (the beer flavored gum)
[AD] Obscenity! (the fragrance that isn't afraid to speak your mind!)
[AD] The Cobinolator! (87 hard-to-use tools in one! Instructions sold separately!)
Infomercials and Miscellaneous
[8F03] Introductory video to the "Ah! Fudge" chocolate factory
[8F11] "We're Sending our Love Down the Well" (singing)
[8F14] Introductory video to "Rancho Relaxo"
[9F11] Voice-over for the Duff Gardens commercial
[9F19] The Springfield Squares
[1F21] Impulse Buying Network (IBN)
[3F12] (celebrity funeral) Herschel Shlomo Krustofsky, aka Krusty The Clown
[3F12] (celebrity funeral) Andre The Giant, We Hardly Knew Ye
[3F12] (celebrity funeral) Shemp Howard, Today We Mourn A Stooge
[SC#17] "Where in the Heck is the People's Republic of Kampuchea?" (travel)
[SC#17] "Boy, Oh Cheboygan!" (travel)
Self Help Videos
[1F05] "Adjusting Your Self-O-Stat" (with Brad Goodman)
[1F05] "Get Confident, Stupid!"
[1F05] "Smoke Yourself Thin"
[SC#5] "Kiss Your Butt Goodbye: Post-Meltdown Emergency Procedures"
Welcome Kiosks
[5F13] "Welcome to Springfield Airport"
[5F13] "Where's Nordstrum?"
[5F13] "The Springfield Knowledgeum"
Medical Films
[4F24] "D.N.A."
[4F24] "Alice Doesn't Live Any More"
[4F24] "Mommy, What's Wrong With That Man's Face?"
Nature Films
[5F22] "Birds: Our Fine Feathered Colleagues"
[5F22] "Earwigs, Ew!"
[5F22] "Man Verses Nature: The Road To Victory"
Circuses
[SC#6] "Silent Partner and Wolfcastle & Krustofski Circus" (host)
[SC#6] "Circus of the Washed-Up B-List Celebrities" (circus?)
Travel Shows
[SC#15] "Where the Heck is the People's Republic of Kampuchea?"
[SC#15] "Boy, Oh Cheboygan!"
Memorable Interruptions
[SC#9] Lisa's book speech
[SC#9] "Your honor, I object. Fatty Airbuckle was with me the whole weekend."
[SC#9] "Not so fast, Mr. Copperfield, what's that in your sock?"
Autobiography
[SC#9] "The Demure McClure"
Fragrances
[3F15] "Smellin' of Troy" (maybe)
Key to abbreviations
#F## = episodes of "The Simpsons" TV show
SI = Simpsons Illustrated magazine
SC = Simpsons Comics (guide)
BM = Bartman comic book (guide)
RM = Radioactive Man comic book (guide)
SJ = Simpsons Joke Book Supplement to Hero Illustrated
TC = Trading Card
AD = AfterDark(tm) Simpsons Screen Saver
I think he will be convicted. Too much to be explained away.
I know this much is True, Michael Jackson will eventually have to stand before God, whatever happens with this earthly trial.
That is hilarious.
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